By Michael Yong

“Now there arose a new king over Egypt, who did not know Joseph.” (Exodus 1:8)

Pharaoh (and his people) knew that God was with Joseph. He told Joseph, “Since God has shown you all this, there is none so discerning and wise as you are” (Genesis 41:39). For Joseph had interpreted the king’s dream, enabling Jews and Egyptians to weather seven years of famine by storing food during seven years of plenty. In Joseph, the Egyptians recognized that God knew the future.

But a new king came to power who knew not Joseph. He and a new era of Egyptians inflicted great suffering on the Jews who lived after Joseph, enslaving them.

The God who had done good to a past generation of Egyptians no longer meant anything to a new generation. Talking about this God to them was a task doomed to fail. This God was no longer meaningful to them.

But through Moses, God revealed a different side of himself. While the previous generation experienced God’s goodness, the new generation experienced the wonders of God – from frogs, gnats, and flies that swarmed the land to hail from the sky to darkness over the land (Exodus 11:9-10).

Every generation of Christians faces new challenges to make God known. Pointing one’s peers to God may be much more difficult than it was for his or her predecessors. Nevertheless, changing times present an opportunity to explore another side of God that a new generation needs to know. For God wants to be known because he “has spoken to us by his Son” (Hebrews 1:2) in the gospel.

Hear the voices of two youths in this REACH as they reach out to their peers. Perhaps, they are telling us that to proclaim the gospel we must live the gospel. We must know God afresh. We must live out the reality of God to today’s youths.